A data flow between two endpoints over a packet switched network can experience packet loss and delays when an on-path intermediary link or device is overloaded or for many other reasons. Packet loss and delay of real-time media flows need to be monitored for numerous management reasons such as to identify where on the path the packet loss and the delays are occurring and to determine whether the packet loss and delays are unacceptable in magnitude.
The Real-Time Protocol (RTP) was designed to natively support robust flow monitoring techniques. Accordingly, when an RTP flow passes through a network device the quality of the RTP flow at that network device can be monitored for outputting RTP metrics that include loss, jitter and latency information. A management device may then aggregate the RTP metrics with RTP metrics output by other network devices on the data path. The aggregated information is then typically used for service monitoring and troubleshooting.
Other protocols besides RTP, such as the Internet Protocol version Four (IPv4), do not support the flow monitoring features of RTP, which makes monitoring these non-RTP flows using existing RTP monitoring resources difficult or impossible. The disclosure that follows solves this and other problems.